The Chronicles: Three Sisters 12

THREE SISTERS Chapter 12

"Bacho is dead?"

Yorun, the blonde one, nodded. The crowd that had gathered around us was surprisingly still. Everyone seemed lost in their own thoughts.

For years now, we had hidden on the Hill, fought to defend it, and spent countless hours watching and waiting for Bacho or his son to come. For my daughters and me, Bacho loomed even larger: he was responsible for the deaths of my wife and my son, and for blighting the lives of my three girls.

Vingoldas nudged my elbow.

- "I'll take them to see Mother Nadesti." he said. That was when I realized that I had been wool-gathering, lost in my memories. I shook my head, to clear it.

- "Yes. Alright ... I'll be along."

I walked off, toward my house. Then I remembered that it was full of Lowlanders. I turned away, toward the river. Yevna and Guenna followed me.

- "Are you alright, Papa?" asked my youngest.

- "Would you rather be alone?" said Yevna. The gap between her teeth never failed to affect me. It hit me hard, just then.

I opened my arms, and embraced my daughters. There was no space for words. Guenna sobbed, a little; Yevna only clutched me, fiercely.

After a time, we separated. Both of my girls examined me carefully, obviously concerned.

- "I'm fine." I said.

- "Are you?" asked Guenna.

- "I am. It's just ... strange. For ten years now, I've dreamed of revenge. What I would say to Bacho. What I would do. None of it ever seemed to be ... enough."

Yevna nodded, as if she understood.

"We had our revenge on Kestutis." I said. "But Bacho died without ever knowing that the attack on us failed. That his son is dead. I meant for him to find Kestutis, tied like an anchor beneath his own boat. It seemed so real to me - as if it had already happened."

"Now ... I don't know."

- "Veran! Veran!"

Prosquetel WhiteHair was yelling at me, waving his arm. Gerimir, the young Lowlander, was running towards us. He slowed down when he realized that I had seen him.

- "Veran - you have to come!" he shouted. "They're going to hang those men!"

We ran. The crowd was loud. Giedra, with her friends Rion and Eliv, were brandishing a rope. Vingoldas was talking to them, while trying to keep himself between the angry women and the three new men. Nameless and Hedyn seemed to be trying to help him.

The situation was not as bad as Gerimir had led me to believe - but it still had the potential to turn ugly.

I stopped just behind Giedra. I was about to grab her arm, but at the last moment I realized how unwise that might be. Instead, I tapped her lightly on the shoulder.

- "Giedra. Giedra!"

- "WHAT?" She turned on me, angrily.

- "Come over here." I suggested, with a jerk of my head.

- "You're not stopping us, Veran!"

- "Those men aren't going anywhere, Giedra. If they're guilty, I'll help you hang them."

- "If they're guilty?" Giedra was still upset, but I could tell that she wasn't going to take my head off, or draw a weapon on me.

- "Come over here. Bring your friends." I said. Then I called to Vingoldas. "Take them inside your house. Put Hedyn and Nameless to guard them."

Eliv glared at me; Rion came along more quietly. I led the three women away from the houses. Guenna and Yevna accompanied me. Gerimir made to follow, but I shook my head, and he let us go.

- "You aren't going to talk us out of this, Veran." said Giedra. "None of your tricks!"

- "That's not fair!" said Guenna. "When has he ever played you false?"

- "Tell me." I said. "Why are you so angry?"

It was Eliv who answered.

- "The dark one - SlumpShoulder. He was at Nareven."

- "When you were raped? He was one of the men who raped you?"

- "No. But he was there."

- "He might well have been raping someone else!" snapped Giedra.

- "I'll ask him." I said.

- "You're going to ask him if he raped anyone?"

I took a deep breath. "I'm going to ask him if he was there. I'll find out how much he'll tell me. And then I'll talk to the other two. You were going to hang all three, weren't you?"

- "They're Bacho's men!" said Giedra.

- "Yorun and the other one are still boys. I'm not sure they've done anything worthy of a hanging, yet." I said.

- "They would have! Eventually. If we hadn't stopped them."

- "Giedra, you can't hang someone for what they might do."

- "Birds of a feather, Veran!" she snapped.

My eldest daughter intervened.

- "Really, Giedra?" said Yevna. "After what we did, the other night ... you'd still question my father?"

The big blonde had no answer to that.

- "While we're at it ..." I said. "Why were you giving Vingoldas such a rough time? He's our chief."

Giedra snorted. "You're the chief, One-Eye."

I stepped closer, so that our faces were only inches apart.

- "The Hill belongs to Guen Nadesti." I said, softly. "And she and I both say that Vingoldas is the chief. You want to contest that?"

I swear, she thought about it for a moment.

- "Alright. We'll do it your way."

- "I trust him." said Rion, the axe woman. Eliv nodded, too.

- "Thank you. Both of you." I said.

With that vote of confidence, I went to see Vingoldas. He was guarding the door of his own house.

- "I'm sorry, Veran." he said. "I was trying to stop them."

- "Don't apologize." I said. "You were stopping them. Hedyn and Nameless were supporting you. All that was needed was an alternative - something other than a 'yes' or a 'no'."

- "You have an alternative in mind?"

- "Let's talk to them. Get Tanguiste over here, will you?" I couldn't think of anyone better at reading people.

Tanguiste and I had a quick conference. She agreed with my idea, wholeheartedly.

The three youths were cowering in Vingoldas' house, watched by Hedyn and Nameless. I thanked both of them, and then called Yorun, the blonde one.

I took him into Guen Nadesti's house. Tanguiste and Mother Nadesti were there.

- "I have a few questions for you." I said.

- "I'll answer." he said. "Thank you for not hanging us."

- "Yet." I said.

- "Papa!" said Tanguiste.

- "Alright." I grumbled. "Yorun - how many times did you go raiding with Kestutis?"

- "Never." said the young man. "It was always 'next year'. I never got to go."

- "What about your friends?"

He was more hesitant, there. Finally, he admitted that his scrawny friend with the downy beard had never gone raiding, either. But the dark one - SlumpShoulder, as Eliv had named him - had raided with Kestutis. He was, despite his youthful appearance, several years older than the other two.

After a few more questions, I sent him outside - but not back to Vingoldas. Instead, I had Yevna and Guenna keep him apart from the other two.

- "I believed him." said Tanguiste.

- "So did I." said Mother Nadesti.

I called for Scrawny - DownyBeard - next. FluffBeard? I was still thinking of nicknames for him when he arrived.

We asked him similar questions. He was just a boy, really - and plainly terrified. His answers were much the same as Yorun's had been.

The dark one, when it was his turn, was sweating even before we asked the first question. I had to admit, Eliv's description of 'SlumpShoulder' was particularly apt.

- "How many times did you go raiding with Kestutis?" I asked him.

- "I didn't." he said. "We ... they said we were too young."

- "Ever been to a place called Nareven?"

- "N-no. I don't know where that is."

- "You're a terrible liar, son." I said.

SlumpShoulder broke down, shortly after that.

- "They made me do it." he whimpered. "I didn't want to."

As I had promised, I helped Giedra, Eliv, and Rion to hang him.

***

Yorun and DownyBeard were obviously unhappy. But what else could I have done? Giedra and her friends were not thrilled, either, to have two of Bacho's men - or boys - on the Hill.

- "They're fleeing from the Izumyrians." I pointed out. "Just like the Duchess and her crew."

- "They're not pregnant." said Rion.

Even the Lowlanders weren't happy.

- "Did you have to hang him?" asked WhiteHair.

- "We need every man we can get." said Iduallon.

- "Need?" I said. "You need rapists, and murderers?"

WhiteHair had the sense to leave me alone, after that - and to take Iduallon with him.

A few days later, our watchers saw Izumyrian riders on the far side of the river. Only a few, at first - and then a large body, of two score or more. We could only hope they would follow the tracks that Yevna and Nameless had left for them. That trail would peter out in the Great Forest. With any luck, the Izumyrians would be busy for a long time.

I had to wonder, though, how many of Bacho's people knew about the Hill. And how long would it be before the Izumyrians found out about us?

***

My three girls and I gathered in Yevna's house - which had once been Moruith's and Inisian's. Sulcen was with us, but Dengelle and Nameless gave us some privacy.

We needed, somehow, to mark the passing of our two greatest enemies. But I didn't even want to mention their names. Let them be forgotten. Instead, we remembered Iarn and Meonwe.

I explained what we intended to do to Sulcen. It didn't feel right to exclude her; on the other hand, I wasn't sure that she wanted to hear about Meonwe. I left it up to her.

- "I would be honoured to be there." she said.

We stood in a semi-circle, in front of the fire. Each of us, in turn, told our favourite memories - our best stories - about our lost family. Sulcen didn't speak, but she held my hand throughout.

***

The very next day, after my turn at watch over the river, I came into the house to find my whole 'extended' family assembled: my three daughters, and Sulcen. Vingoldas. Dengelle, recovering slowly from the wound she had suffered in the fight against Kestutis, and Nameless were there as well.

Vingoldas immediately stood, and gave up his stool for me.

- "Sit down, Papa." said Tanguiste.

- "What's going on?"

- "Guenna will explain." said my middle daughter. "Just hear her out."

I sat down, facing my youngest. Vingoldas and Tanguiste went to stand behind her.

- "Papa ..." she said. "We have to leave."

Of all the things I might have expected to hear ... that wasn't one of them.

- "You? All three of you? Why am I always the last one to find out?"

- "No - all of us. We all have to leave the Hill."

- "What?"

- "As soon as possible. Tomorrow, if we can."

- "Now wait just a -"

- "Papa!" said Tanguiste, sharply.

I felt a hand on my shoulder. It was Yevna's.

- "Listen to her. Please."

- "Papa, I've thought about this - over and over." said Guenna. "We have to leave. Before the Izumyrians come."

- "They don't even -"

- "I know what you're going to say: they don't know that we're here. But they will. One of Bacho's people will tell them. For gain, or for revenge. Or the Izumyrians will follow Yevna's false trail, and realise that they were duped."

"One way or another, they'll find out that the Duchess simply vanished. They'll look elsewhere, and discover that she was never there. It may take them weeks - maybe longer. But eventually they will learn about the Hill."

I was about to speak, but she forestalled me.

"I know - even if they do find out that she's here, they won't be able to climb the Hill. They're horsemen. Not boatmen. We can hold them off indefinitely, just as we did Bacho and Kestutis."

I don't know how Guenna knew it; that was exactly what I had intended to say.

Yevna knelt beside me.

- "Maybe we can defeat them, if they try to climb the Hill. Maybe. But I don't like our chances against forty of fifty soldiers. Warriors, Papa - not scum like Bacho's."

"They don't even have to get onto the Hill." said my eldest. "They have the numbers, to throw a cordon around us."

- "We'd be surrounded." said Vingoldas.

- "There are too many people on the Hill, now." said Yevna. "We may have the fighters to repel an attack. But there are simply too many mouths to feed - especially over the winter."

I hadn't thought of that. But it was true. If the enemy were out there, Yevna would be denied some of her favourite hunting grounds. We didn't have enough houses for the newcomers - and we would have trouble feeding them.

- "The Izumyrians don't have to take the Hill." said Guenna. "All they have to do is cut us off. And you know as well as I do - if they suspect that the Duchess is here, they won't stop until they have her."

"They'll bring more men, too. Hundreds, maybe."

She was right. I could see it. The Hill was a fortress - but it was a deathtrap, if we stayed. Guenna was watching my face. She could see that she was winning me over.

"We have to leave, Papa." she said.

- "Where?" I said. "Where do we go?"

- "Into the mountains." said Yevna. "North of the Three Sisters."

We knew the land. That much was true. But as I pictured the mountain slopes where we had met Moruith and Inisian, my heart sank.

- "We can't." I said. "It's not possible."

- "Why not?" asked Yevna.

- "Mother Nadesti could never make that trip." I said. "And not only her." Hedyn's wife was pregnant again, and they had two small children. There were two other elderly women who couldn't travel far, and several youngsters who wouldn't bear up well under a long march. And we had a pregnant Duchess.

- "They'll make it." said Yevna.

- "I thought it through." said Guenna. "I tried to guess what would happen if we left the older women, and some of the younger children behind. Perhaps, I thought, the Izumyrians wouldn't make war on harmless non-combatants."

"But they would, Papa. You saw Asphodels in flames. And Nadesti. If they found a settlement with no men, no young women - they'd know we were in hiding. They would torture and kill to find out where we'd gone. And they would burn our houses when they were done."

"You know they would."

I didn't even try to argue. Guenna was right again. I tried to picture Mother Nadesti, struggling up some of the mountain paths ... and then I caught Dengelle's eye.

- "What about you, Dengelle? Could you make such a trip?"

The whisper of a smile flickered over her lips.

- "I'll keep up. Don't worry about me, Father One-Eye." she said.

- "I don't know." I admitted. "It could be ... awful."

- "The move will be hard." said Tanguiste. "Painful. But to stay here could prove fatal. For all of us."

I looked around the room. Guenna had convinced her sisters, at any rate. Dengelle, too. And Vingoldas would probably jump off a cliff, if Tan asked him to. Nameless met my eye, and slowly inclined her head - just once, but it was enough.

The last person I looked to was my wife.

- "She's right, Veran." said Sulcen.

They were right. I knew they were. But the immensity of it - the sheer enormity of the effort it would require - was beyond daunting. Old women, pregnant women, little children and babes in arms ... and if Izumyrians on horseback caught us in the open? It would take us two days, or more, just to get into the hills.

Guenna let out a long sigh. She had been watching my face, and she knew my response before I had even made it.

- "You're with us." she said.

- "Of course I am. But we'll have our work cut out for us, convincing everyone else."

***

Sulcen took Tanguiste, to talk to Mother Nadesti. Guenna and Nameless went to see Giedra and her friends. I decided that Hedyn deserved to learn of it from me, before he heard it elsewhere. Vingoldas would speak to Seva and Weyl. Yevna made the rounds, to check on the Watchers, and let them know what was being discussed.

Then we went from house to house, calling everyone to meet in front of Guen Nadesti's home. Hedyn and I stacked some wood, to make a small fire. I had a few moments to confer with Guen Nadesti and Vingoldas. We quickly agreed on how to proceed.

Most of the Hill knew what was going on. Or, at the very least, they knew that something major was afoot.

Guen Nadesti shuffled over, next to the fire. She didn't have to raise her voice.

- "I call an open council." she said. She glanced at the Duchess. "I'll explain, briefly, for the sake of our guests from outside. This is not a debate, nor an argument. One person will speak, and when they have finished, we will listen to anyone else who wishes to be heard."

"It may take some time." said Mother Nadesti, with a grin. "But it's a lovely evening, so we won't get cold." She turned, and shuffled a few steps back, to sit on the stool we had provided for her.

There was another stool for the pregnant Duchess, and one for Hedyn's wife. Virtually everyone else sat on the grass. I counted 49 people, including the Lowlanders.

Tanguiste stood, and moved nearer the fire, so that everyone could see her.

- "My sister Guenna is very wise." she said. "She understood something before the rest of us had even begun to think about it."

"The arrival of the Duchess of Hvad changes everything for us."

It was Guenna's idea. And she had discussed it - thoroughly - with Yevna and Nameless. But we all agreed that Tanguiste was the best person to present their ideas. She was well liked, and respected for her kindness and good sense.

She was also a good speaker - immeasurably better than Guenna, or Vingoldas, or me, for that matter. Tanguiste had a knack for finding the proper words.

"The Izumyrians are looking for the Duchess and her party." she began. "They are a very different enemy than Bacho and Kestutis."

"Bacho had 35 men. The Izumyrians have over 100. Perhaps as many as 150, if Yorun is right. Professional soldiers, serving their lords, unlike the rapists and murderers who served Bacho, for the most part."

"There are more of these foes, too - the Izumyrians. There are several thousand, now, in the Lowlands. What I mean by that is that even if we somehow defeat the hundred who are here ... more will come. There will always be more."

"In the past few years, we've trusted our Hill, to hide and protect us. It is no easy thing, to attack us here."

People nodded. They were justly proud of what we had done.

"But my sister points out that the Izumyrians don't have to capture the Hill. Oh, they may try - and we could make them pay. We might even hold out here, against their assaults."

"But what if they surround us? These Izumyrians share one trait with Bacho: they are unlikely to quit. They won't give up and go away."

Tanguiste let that idea hang in the air, for a while. She went to stand beside Yevna.

"My sister Yevna has hunted for us. We have all benefited from her skill, and from Dengelle's, as well. Now we have more skilled archers - Giedra, and Nameless. Libot."

Libot was one of the new men. He was a good shot. He seemed surprised to have been named.

"But where are they to hunt, if the Izumyrians surround us?" asked Tanguiste.

"Look around you. There are more of us than ever. More people to feed. How are we to do this, if the Izumyrians cut us off?"

My daughter let that sink in, too. She came to stand next to me.

"What are we to do, then?" she asked. "I asked the best fighters we have: can we hold here? We can fight these invaders, they said. We do not fear them. But we cannot fight hunger."

"In that case ... what options do we have?"

"I will suggest three. After that, I will listen to anyone who can suggest another alternative."

"Here is my first suggestion: we could hand over the Lowlanders."

Both of the young Hvadi leapt to their feet. Gerimir stepped in front of the Duchess. Iduallon, ever more dramatic, drew his blade.

- "Over my dead body!" he shouted.

Vingoldas stood, slowly, and Hedyn beside him.

- "That would be easy to arrange, Iduallon." said Vingoldas. He was completely calm. "I will warn you only once, Lowlander: you do not interrupt the speaker. Once more, and I will see you bound and gagged. Is that clear?"